Children, Dogs and Education: Caring for, Learning Alongside, and Gaining Support from Canine Companions

Mary Renck Jalongo

May 2018 · Springer

About this ebook

This book brings together authoritative information about the child/dog bond as it is manifested with family dogs, visiting therapy dogs, and service dogs trained to assist children with disabilities. Despite the widely accepted view that participating in a dog’s care and interacting with dogs in behaviorally healthy ways is a route to becoming responsible and compassionate, research on this complex dynamic is difficult to design, time-consuming to collect, and challenging to analyze. This volume synthesizes theory, research, and practice, bringing all to bear upon child/dog interactions in homes, schools, libraries, and the community at large. Children, Dogs and Education serves as a handbook for a diverse group of adults who seek to build positive relationships between children and dogs—parents/families, professional dog trainers, teachers, librarians, mental health professionals, health care professionals, and university faculty. The study of interactions between human and nonhuman animals has captured the imagination of an international community of researchers from many different fields and professions. Even though dogs are ubiquitous in the lives of most children, studies of children’s interactions with dogs in families and communities are lacking. Most of the previous research on the human-canine bond has focused on adolescents and adults or, even when younger children are the focus, it has tended to rely on parents to speak for children. There are three features of this book that make it unique. First, it goes beyond exploring the child/dog bond to examine additional important issues, including: children’s concepts of responsible care, their ability to interpret dogs’ behavioral cues, and their ideas about canine behavioral issues/training. Second, unlike most other work to date, it represents children’s voices through cases, interviews, and drawings. Finally, the contributors to this edited work use their collective wisdom to draw educational implications and suggest direction in preparing the next generation of dog guardians.

About the author

Mary Renck Jalongo, Ph.D. has worked for Springer as the editor-in-chief of a bi-monthly journal since 1995 and as senior editor for their Educating the Young Child book series since 2006. She is the author, co-author, or editor of over 30 books with various publishers including Jossey-Bass, Teachers College Press, Allyn & Bacon, McGraw-Hill, and Pearson. In 2015, she earned emeritus status from Indiana University of Pennsylvania where she was a professor for 38 years and was honored as the outstanding university professor in 1992. More recently, her work has focused on the human-animal bond. Books on the topic include The World's Children and Their Companion Animals: Developmental and Educational Significance of the Child/Pet Bond (Association for Childhood Education International, 2004) and Teaching Compassion: Humane Education in Early Childhood (Springer, 2013). In addition, she has co-authored numerous journal articles on the child-canine bond for Childhood Education, Society & Animals, Early Childhood Education Journal, and the national Parent-Teacher Association's Our Children. She volunteers frequently with her registered and insured therapy dogs at the university, in elementary schools, in public and academic libraries, and mental and physical health care facilities. Since 2015, she has been teaching in a service dog training program housed in a correctional facility. In this initiative, carefully selected prison inmates acquire the skills of professional dog trainers and prepare these animals to assist people with a disability. In terms of practical experience with dogs, Mary volunteers three days a week at an animal shelter, is a tester/observer for Alliance of therapy dogs, and is a frequent contributor to Celebrating Greyhounds.